Haiku News - Masaoka Shiki Day & John Crook Memorial

Wednesday 19 September 2001
at WHC Headquarters, Oxfordshire, England

Following the successful London Conference “Reappraising Masaoka Shiki (1867-1902)” in May 2001, the World Haiku Club’s new initiative is its second conference. Held on the day of Shiki's death, called Shiki-ki in Japan ( i.e. 19 September 2001), the memorial constitutes part of WHC’s two-year-long celebrations of the centenary of Shiki’s death.

On that day, two people are remembered, Shiki, as the father of modern haiku, and late John Crook, who loved Shiki.

Events of the one-day conference include ginko, an informal workshop and haiga practice, papers on Shiki and on other topics and free discussion. The evening reception includes a lecture and haiku readings, part of which is to remember late John Crook, WHC Deputy Chairman, by reading his haiku and some of the tribute haiku written by haijin across the world in memory of him. The day also marks the celebration of the success of WHC in furtherance of haiku movement world-wide.